Pride, Responsibility and Integrity

by Janie Jones

I’m feeling a little unsettled today.

I got an email from someone at Stickittoyou U yesterday. Apparently they want to interview me about my scholarships and grants.

This year I’m getting in excess of $14,000 of “free” money, meaning I don’t have to pay it back, for tuition and school related expenses. Most are need-based, but some are merit based and have minimum GPA requirements. These funds will cover about 90% of my tuition, books and fees.

Yes, it rocks. Yes, I’m extremely grateful. Yes, I do feel honored and lucky. And yes, I’ve worked very hard to get the best grades I can to be worthy and have applied for up to 50 some scholarships for this year. But, there is a part of me that is also very embarrassed and ashamed to not be able to support myself and my daughter without all this need based funding.

It feels very much like being interviewed and having my story pasted all over the school homepage and “other uses” is trying to make me seem like someone of distinction to be honored and looked up to when I have done nothing but find myself too poor to make my own way in the world and too under-educated to get the good paying jobs (ie, more than minimum wage) that would allow me to live an average middle class life I was accustomed to before “life” happened.

Sure, everyone needs a hand up once and a while and people and organizations who give out scholarship and grant money are trying to acknowledge and help us who are less fortunate better ourselves. But, it seems to me if you have a proper sense of pride, self respect and integrity you should be celebrating the donors, not the people who have done nothing but accept their generosity.

While many people fail to see my side of this issue, awards ceremonies and interviews just drive home my shame in being unable to provide for myself. It feels like celebrating my failure. I have done nothing to deserve to be celebrated, yet. Everyone, in my opinion should strive to better themselves, what I’m doing is not special, or unique. It should be normal, average, and expected.

So, I do thank the donors. It allows me to do what I have to in order to be a better person and one day again be able to provide for myself and my family. But I’m not there yet. Currently I’m a hot mess of stress, frustration, panic, fear, longing, exhaustion, and insecurity. It’s too soon to see beyond the struggle. I am grateful for the help but it’s way too soon to see anything in my situation for praise or admiration and I don’t want to be an object of pity either.

I just want to say a heartfelt thank you and go about my business. Why is that so weird to the world?

College is a very weird place full of misdirection, hypocrisy and liberalism. It is a necessary evil and while it teaches me a lot, it is not necessarily teaching me the things it sets out on paper to teach. One of those things is just how screwed up it is. From a certain perspective, that in itself is a very valuable lesson to be thankful for learning.

Yep, college is all that and then some, couldn’t agree more. What cracks me up is they purport to “teach” critical thinking, but really you’re pretty much assaulted with nonstop one-sided stuff, or the other side is presented but in an evil way. Gee that’s fair.